Can a State Delegate Police Power to a Religious Institution?

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The North Carolina Court of Appeals addressed a very interesting question in a case involving Davidson College (NC v. Yencer): Whether it violated the First Amendment to delegate state police power to a religious institution, and in particular to its campus police force.

The Court applied the “Lemon test,” which was developed by the U.S. Supreme Court to analyze establishment clause cases.  This third prong of the test was applicable to this case: whether the state statute fostered “an excessive government entanglement with religion.”

The Court held that the delegation of power to Davidson College was a violation of the First Amendment.

However, the opinion may not be all bad news for Davidson College:

1) The Court didn’t seem convinced that Davidson was a religious institution for Establishment Clause purposes but felt bound to conclude that it was because of past NC Supreme Court precedent.

2) In North Carolina, a unanimous decision (such as this case) by the Court of Appeals precludes an appeal as a matter of right to the NC Supreme Court.  The Court of Appeals went out of its way though to urge the Supreme Court to grant review of this case.

This certainly is a case worth following for institutions across the country–while it isn’t controlling precedent on other states, it could be influential if and when other states take up similar issues.